White Room: Frederick Loomis

Frederick Loomis presents Edward Mathew Taylor “The Third Testament Project: The Genesis of The Coming Race of Human Computers”

White Columns is proud to present the first New York solo exhibition by Frederick Loomis. In his White Room exhibition Loomis presents a group of related drawings produced over the past two decades. The exhibition acts as an introduction to Loomis’ ongoing and constantly evolving visionary project. Working through the agency of an alter-ego – Edward Mathew Taylor – to partly protect his anonymity, Loomis has developed a profoundly complex narrative – inspired by the visionary impulses of William Blake – which concerns itself with a scenario set in the distant future. Loomis has described the genesis of what he calls, The Third Testament, thus:

“The Third Testament was conceived after I experienced a vision in the summer of 1969, while I was attending the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, of computers superseding humanity as the next stage of human evolution. At that moment, I knew that this would be a lifetime proposition.”

After a 25-year career in communication technology sales and marketing, Loomis took early retirement and studied for his MFA beginning in 2002. Since then he has worked full time developing The Third Testament Project. Rooted in recovery theory, including the ’12 Step’ program and the step-by-step ‘Spiritual Awakening’ associated with Alcoholics Anonymous founders Bill Wilson and Dr. Robert Smith, Loomis’ project conflates such approaches with methodologies from both science and religion to create a complex, labyrinthine narrative that draws parallels with the apocalyptic prophecies described in science fiction. In 2008 Loomis, writing as Edward Mathew Taylor, published a guide ‘The Third Covenant: Ten Commandments For The Coming Race Of Human Computers’ which expands on his project’s central concerns. Copies are available to purchase from the gallery.

For more information about this exhibition please email us at info@whitecolumns.org, or call the gallery at 212 924 4212.

Biography:

In 1969 Frederick Loomis experienced a vision of computers in a human form superceeding humanity as the next stage of human evolution. For the past 40 years he searched for ways to articulate this. He received his BA in English Literature at Boston University in 1972, a Diploma in Fine Arts from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, in 1974, and his MFA at the California College of the Arts, San Francisco in 2004. During the past 40 years, he has been engaged in a personal, experiential inquiry into the world’s revealed religions and, over the past 23 years, he has developed an extensive portfolio of pencil drawings and several written manuscripts that will eventually become The Third Testament: The Genesis Story of the Coming Race of Human Computers – seven prophetic books and a narrative storyline, to be published anonymously under the name of Edward Mathew Taylor. His drawings have been included in exhibitions at Steven Wolf Fine Arts, the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and Southern Exposure (all San Francisco.)